Tuesday, December 31, 2013

A new paper published in Nature claims global warming reduces low clouds, the opposite of what has been claimed in the past. For example, the forthcoming IPCC AR5 notes climate models have predicted that in a warmer climate, increased evaporation will increase low cloud thickness, vertical, and horizontal extent, all of which increases reflection of sunlight [albedo], cools the planet, and acts as a negative feedback.

"The modelled response of low clouds does not appear to be dominated by a single feedback mechanism, but rather the net effect of several potentially competing mechanisms as elucidated in LES and GCM sensitivity studies (e.g., Zhang and Bretherton, 2008; Blossey et al., 2013; Bretherton et al., 2013). Starting with some proposed negative feedback mechanisms, it has been argued that in a warmer climate, low clouds will be: (i) horizontally more extensive, because changes in the lapse rate of temperature also modify the lower tropospheric stability (Miller, 1997); (ii) optically thicker, because adiabatic ascent is accompanied by a larger condensation rate (Somerville and Remer, 1984); and (iii) vertically more extensive, in response to a weakening of the tropical overturning circulation (Caldwell and Bretherton, 2009)." - AR5 draft pg 7-20

The authors base the claim upon their computer model which allegedly overturns the prior 'settled science' on clouds and thereby proclaims the globe will warm 4C by 2100.

"They report in Nature that updraughts of water vapour can rise 15 kms to form high clouds that produce heavy rains, or the vapour can rise just a few kilometers before coming back to the surface without forming rain clouds. When this happens the process actually reduces the overall cloud cover because it dessicates the clouds above: it draws away water vapour from the higher regions in a process called convective mixing. [see New paper finds IPCC climate models don't realistically simulate convection and thus convective mixing]

In a warmer world there may be fewer clouds – and less of a cooling effectImage: Fir0002 at English Wikipedia

By Tim Radford

One of the great unknowns of climate science is what effect clouds have in accelerating or slowing warming. A new study sheds a disturbing light on their possible impact.

LONDON, 31 December – Australian and French scientists believe they have cracked one of the great puzzles of climate change and arrived at a more accurate prediction of future temperatures.

The news is not good, according to Steven Sherwood of Australia’s Centre for Excellence for Climate System Science at the University of New South Wales. If carbon emissions are not reduced, then by 2100 the world will have warmed by 4°C.

This figure does not, at first, sound high: researchers have been warning for 20 years on the basis of computer models that under the notorious business-as-usual scenario in which everybody goes on burning coal and oil, then as carbon dioxide levels double, global temperatures could rise by between 1.5°C and 4.5°C.

Pessimists could cite one extreme, optimists the other: the range of uncertainty was a recognition that there were still some big unknowns in the machinery of climate, and one of those unknowns was the behaviour of the clouds in a warmer world.

More warmth means more evaporation, more vapour could mean more clouds. Low-level clouds reflect sunlight back into space, and help cool the climate a bit. This is what engineers call negative feedback.

Drying the clouds

But if more water vapour actually led to less cloud, then more sunlight would reach the surface and the world would warm even more: positive feedback would be in play. Climate models cater for such possibilities, but cannot choose between them.

What Sherwood and his colleagues from Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris did was to start with some real-world observations of what happens when water vapour gets into the atmosphere.

They report in Nature that updraughts of water vapour can rise 15 kms to form high clouds that produce heavy rains, or the vapour can rise just a few kilometers before coming back to the surface without forming rain clouds.

When this happens the process actually reduces the overall cloud cover because it dessicates the clouds above: it draws away water vapour from the higher regions in a process called convective mixing.

Profound effects in prospect

So the next step was to feed the new understanding into computer simulations. These then showed that climate cycles could develop that would take vapour to a wider range of heights in the atmosphere, with the consequence that fewer clouds would form as climate warms.

If so – and other climate scientists will have their own arguments with the findings – then as carbon dioxide levels double, which they will do in the next 50 years or so, the average planetary temperatures will increase by a colossal 4°C.

Governments have expressed the wish – but not so far taken the necessary action – to contain planetary temperatures to a rise of no more than 2°C. If Sherwood and colleagues are right, they will not get their wish. And the process will go on. The temperatures will continue to soar beyond 2100, to reach an additional 8°C by 2200.

“Climate skeptics like to criticise climate models for getting things wrong, and we are the first to admit they are not perfect, but what we are finding is that the mistakes are being made by those models that predict less warming, not those that predict more”, said Professor Sherwood.

“Rises in global average temperatures of this magnitude will have profound impacts on the world and the economies of many countries if we don’t urgently curb our emissions.” – Climate News Network

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Abstract

Equilibrium climate sensitivity refers to the ultimate change in global mean temperature in response to a change in external forcing. Despite decades of research attempting to narrow uncertainties, equilibrium climate sensitivity estimates from climate models still span roughly 1.5 to 5 degrees Celsius for a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, precluding accurate projections of future climate. The spread arises largely from differences in the feedback from low clouds, for reasons not yet understood. Here we show that differences in the simulated strength of convective mixing between the lower and middle tropical troposphere explain about half of the variance in climate sensitivity estimated by 43 climate models. The apparent mechanism is that such mixing dehydrates the low-cloud layer at a rate that increases as the climate warms, and this rate of increase depends on the initial mixing strength, linking the mixing to cloud feedback. The mixing inferred from observations appears to be sufficiently strong to imply a climate sensitivity of more than 3 degrees for a doubling of carbon dioxide. This is significantly higher than the currently accepted lower bound of 1.5 degrees, thereby constraining model projections towards relatively severe future warming.

The Obama administration says it will not reconsider a new carbon emissions formula for federal regulations.

The conservative group Landmark Legal Foundation filed a petition in August calling on the Department of Energy (DOE) to strike the provision on the "social cost of carbon" from a microwave efficiency rule.

The DOE denied the petition and said the input on the social cost of carbon provision "did not influence [its] decision regarding the final energy conservation standard chosen."

Reconsidering the rule would not change the standard adopted for microwave ovens, the department said in an early copy of its response that will be published Tuesday.

The social cost of carbon directive, which was updated in June by the Office of Management and Budget, bumped the cost of carbon to $35 per metric ton from $21. The new formula will dramatically increase the projected benefits of regulations that clamp down on air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions.

Landmark decried the formula and the way it was developed.

"DOE's unannounced, dramatically increased, and improperly altered ‘Social Cost of Carbon’ (‘SCC’) valuation presented for the first time in this microwave oven regulation will certainly become the standard by which all other agencies will place a purportedly beneficial economic value on new carbon regulations,” the June petition filed by Landmark stated.

The Energy Department said it provided enough notice and opportunity for public comment as required by law.

In November, the administration released data behind its decision to increase the social cost of carbon, which Republicans on Capitol Hill said was crafted in a "black box" without adequate oversight.“Rigorous evaluation of costs and benefits is a core tenet of the rulemaking process,” the White House’s Office of Management and Budget said in its November notice. “It is particularly important in the area of climate change."

Business groups have challenged the carbon rules, and the House voted in August to block the Environmental Protection Agency from weighing the benefits of curbing carbon emissions in major energy-related regulations.

I could go on and on. Now, I know I’m not going to change the minds of any of the True Believers…those who read all of Reverend Al’s sermons, and say things like, “You know, global warming can mean warmer OR colder, wetter OR drier, cloudier OR sunnier, windier OR calmer, …”. Can I get an ‘amen’?? But I hope I can still save a few of those out there who are still capable of independent reasoning and thought. - Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.

Global Warming Means Less Snow.

"The probability of any precipitation falling as snow rather than rain is going to decrease, and any snow lying on the ground is going to melt more quickly," she said.

"Looking at the United States of America, the IPCC clearly warned that unchecked global warming will lead toreduced snow pack in the western mountains, critically reducing access to water, which is our lifeblood." -Senator Barbara Boxer (D)

According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, within a few years winter snowfall will become "a very rare and exciting event". "Children just aren't going to know what snow is," he said.

Gore's claim of snow being "consistent" with global warming is also at odds with is Oscar Winning 2006 film “An Inconvenient Truth.” Gore never once warned of record cold and increasing snowfalls as a consequence of man-made global warming in that film. But Gore has hyped the lack of snow as "evidence" for man-made global warming.

"He also remarked that the most optimistic climate models for the second half of this century suggest that 30 to 70% of the snow pack will disappear. Now, no wonder we have people visiting our offices who are just already hurting from the recreation industry in this nation. They see what's happening." -Barbara Boxer, October 29th, 2007, on the Senate floor

Barbara Boxer 2009: "Looking at the United States of America, the IPCC clearly warned that unchecked global warming will lead to reduced snow pack in the western mountains, critically reducing access to water, which is our lifeblood."

Our conclusion that these models predict a significant decrease in snow extent over North America during the 21st century is robust, in the sense that all available models agree for two different yet realistic SRES future emissions scenarios, while no model predicts such a decrease for the unrealistic COMMIT scenario.

“As temperatures rise, the likelihood of precipitation falling as rain rather than snow increases, especially in autumn and spring at the beginning and end of the snow season, and in areas where temperatures are near freezing. Such changes are observed in many places, especially over land in middle and high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, leading to increased rains but reduced snowpacks.” (IPCC)

CSIRO climate change expert Dr Penny Whetton says Australia's mountain snow cover could be reduced by up to 54 per cent by 2020. "The probability of any precipitation falling as snow rather than rain is going to decrease, and any snow lying on the ground is going to melt more quickly," she said.

Like those who rely on the Great Barrier Reef, the Australian ski industry sees itself as a frontline victim of global warming. A 2003 CSIRO report, part-funded by the ski industry, found that the resorts could lose a quarter of their snow in 15 years, and half by 2050. The worst case was a 96 per cent loss of snow by mid-century.

CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts, October 4, 2006 (ENS) - Global warming will cause major changes to the climate of the U.S. Northeast if greenhouse gas emissions are not reduced, scientists said today. Warmer annual temperatures, less snow, more frequent droughts and more extreme rainstorms are expected if current warming trends continue, the scientists said in a new study, and time is running out for action to avoid such changes to the climate.

The idea that global warming will bring more rain and less snow goes back to at least 1999, when a University of California, Santa Barbara researcher said "There will be too much water at the wrong time and too little when we need it."

Sledges, snowmen, snowballs and the excitement of waking to find that the stuff has settled outside are all a rapidly diminishing part of Britain's culture, as warmer winters - which scientists are attributing to global climate change - produce not only fewer white Christmases, but fewer white Januaries and Februaries.

According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, within a few years winter snowfall will become "a very rare and exciting event". "Children just aren't going to know what snow is," he said.

Global Warming Means More Snow.

"If the climate continues to warm, we should expect an increase in heavy snow events for a few decades."

"As it turns out, the scientific community has been addressing this particular question for some time now and they say that increased heavy snowfalls are completely consistent with what they have been predicting as a consequence of man-made global warming." -Al Gore

Global warming means more snowstorms: scientists - "Heavy snowstorms are not inconsistent with a warming planet," said scientist Jeff Masters, as part of a conference call with reporters and colleagues convened by the Union of Concern Scientists.

John Christy, the Alabama state climatologist who authored the study, said the amount of snow in the mountains has not decreased in the past 50 years, a period when greenhouse gases were supposed to have increased the effects of global warming.

Brace yourselves now — this may be a case of politicians twisting the facts. There is some evidence that climate change could in fact make such massive snowstorms more common, even as the world continues to warm.

Climate scientists say they can't prove any single weather event is due to climate change. Thus, they say, Hurricane Katrina or the heat wave in Vancouver that's dogging the Winter Olympics isn't proof that climate change is happening. Nor can southern and eastern snowstorms prove that it's not.

Snow is consistent with global warming, say scientists. Britain may be in the grip of the coldest winter for 30 years and grappling with up to a foot of snow in some places but the extreme weather is entirely consistent with global warming, claim scientists.

"If the climate continues to warm, we should expect an increase in heavy snow events for a few decades, until the climate grows so warm that we pass the point where it's too warm for it to snow heavily."

As it turns out, the scientific community has been addressing this particular question for some time now and they say that increased heavy snowfalls are completely consistent with what they have been predicting as a consequence of man-made global warming

Dr. Kaku agreed with the suggestion: "Yes. It seems to violate common sense, but as the Earth begins to heat up, that means more moist air in the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico on average. Which creates more precipitation, and eventually more snow."

Over the past few weeks, subzero temperatures in Poland claimed 66 lives; snow arrived in Seattle well before the winter solstice, and fell heavily enough in Minneapolis to make the roof of the Metrodome collapse; and last week blizzards closed Europe’s busiest airports in London and Frankfurt for days, stranding holiday travelers. The snow and record cold have invaded the Eastern United States, with more bad weather predicted.

“As it turns out, the scientific community has been addressing this particular question for some time now and they say that increased heavy snowfalls are completely consistent with what they have been predicting as a consequence of man-made global warming,” Gore wrote. Unfortunately for Gore and others who have claimed that the snow this winter is a global warming byproduct, their own authorities have said climate change will result in less snow.

In fact, scientists have been warning for at least two decades that global warming could make snowstorms more severe. Snow has two simple ingredients: cold and moisture. Warmer air collects moisture like a sponge until it hits a patch of cold air. When temperatures dip below freezing, a lot of moisture creates a lot of snow.

Global Warming Scientists Forced To Admit Defeat

Trapped Climate Expedition Ignored Reality

They went in search evidence of the world’s melting ice caps, but instead a team of climate scientists have been forced to abandon their mission … because the Antarctic ice is thicker than usual at this time of year. The scientists have been stuck aboard the stricken MV Akademik Schokalskiy since Christmas Day, with repeated sea rescue attempts being abandoned as icebreaking ships failed to reach them. Now that effort has been ditched, with experts admitting the ice is just too thick. Instead the crew have built an icy helipad, with plans afoot to rescue the 74-strong team by helicopter. --Mia De Graaf and Hayley O’Keeffe, Daily Mail, 31 December 2013

A rescue mission for a ship stuck in ice in Antarctica is under threat as reports have emerged that one of the assisting vessels may itself be stuck. Fifty-two passengers and four crew members were due to be evacuated by helicopter from China's Xue Long ship as soon as conditions allowed. However, the Xue Long has barely moved in a day and may be stuck in the ice. If the Chinese vessel is also stuck and the Australian vessel cannot help it reach clear water, there will be no airlift. --BBC News, 31 December 2013

Whenever the ice at the North and South Pole is mentioned, it is mostly in the context of melting ice triggered by global warming. However, the sea ice in Antarctica – in contrast to that in the Arctic – has proved to be remarkably robust. New measurements have now confirmed that. As the U.S. space agency NASA announced, the sea ice in the Antarctic has extended over an area of ​​19.47 million square meters at the end of September. That is the highest since measurements began in 1979. --Spiegel Online, 21 October 2013

The leader of a scientific expedition whose ship remains stranded in Antarctic ice says the team, which set out to prove climate change, is “stuck in our own experiment.” But Chris Turney, a professor of climate change at Australia’s University of New South Wales, said it was “silly” to suggest he and 73 others aboard the MV Akademic Shokalskiy were trapped in ice they’d sought to prove had melted. He remained adamant that sea ice is melting, even as the boat remained trapped in frozen seas. --Paul Tilsley, Fox News, 30 December 2013

Years ago, global warming believers renamed the phenomenon "climate change" - probably because of pesky details like unusually cold weather undercutting the warming argument. Now, just as advocates argue that Earth is approaching a tipping point, there's so much ice floating in Antarctica during the Southern Hemisphere's summer that the Australasian Antarctic Expedition posted in a statement: "We're stuck in our own experiment." Too bad the folks who are supposed to predict climate decades into the future are guided by scientists who could not manage to avoid ice floes during a five-week trip. --Debra Saunders, San Francisco Chronicle, 30 December 2013

According to Chris Turney, leader of the expedition trapped in the ice off the coast of Antarctica, the expanding sea ice has been caused by global warming. He obviously has not bothered checking the facts. First, a look at UAH satellite temperature anomalies for the region. The purple line is the trend, not the mean, but as can be seen is, to all intents and purposes flat. Any trend is actually negative. --Paul Homewood, Not a Lot Of People Know That, 30 December 2013

Tony Abbott’s top business adviser has accused the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change of “dishonesty and deceit” as it focuses on “exploiting the masses and extracting more money” in a climate crusade. Maurice Newman, chairman of the prime minister’s new Business Advisory Council, used an interview with the Australian newspaper to launch a strongly worded attack on the global body that provides advice to governments on the body of scientific findings about climate change. Newman also argued Australia had fallen “hostage to climate change madness” but he believed the “scientific delusion” was crumbling amid suggestions the global temperature could drop to little ice age levels. --Daniel Hurst, The Guardian, 31 December 2013

How technology can halt climate change. What will it take to fix global warming? Scientists say the world, within a few decades, will need to switch to energy that doesn't emit greenhouse gases. Even the optimists agree, it won't be easy. USA Today

Global warming researcher gets stuck in ice. A funny thing happened during Australian climate-change professor Chris Turney's venture to retrace a 1912 research expedition in Antarctica and gauge how climate change has affected the continent: Two weeks into a five-week excursion, Turney's good ship MV Akademik Shokalskiy got trapped in ice. San Francisco Chronicle

New England town budgets feel the force of 3 major storms.Winter is off to a robust start in the Northeast. Thousands of New Englanders spent Christmas without electricity and a new storm meant more power outages Sunday night. The city of Portland is about a third of the way through its million-dollar, winter-weather budget. Morning Edition

Home electricity use in US falling to 2001 levels. Because of more energy-efficient housing, appliances and gadgets, power usage is on track to decline in 2013 for the third year in a row, to 10,819 kilowatt-hours per household, according to the Energy Information Administration. Associated Press

In search of the next Big Fix to combat climate change. As in the 1890s, society is once again looking for the next Big Fix -- whether high-altitude wind kites, "plug and play" nuclear reactors, giant synthetic trees to absorb carbon dioxide or sulfate aerosols to cool the planet. USA Today

Pictures: Ten biggest energy stories of 2013. Thanks to the fracking revolution, in 2013 the United States surged past both Saudi Arabia and Russia to regain its spot as the world's top energy producer. Just in time for the 40th anniversary of the Arab oil embargo, the U.S. finally might approach its goal of independence from foreign oil. National Geographic News

DOE stands by 'social cost of carbon.' The Obama administration says it will not reconsider a new carbon emissions formula for federal regulations. The conservative group Landmark Legal Foundation filed a petition in August calling on the Department of Energy to strike the provision on the "social cost of carbon" from a microwave efficiency rule. The Hill

A paper published today in Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology finds that the last 4 interglacials were up to 3C warmer than the current interglacial and were characterized by sea levels up to 79 feet [24 meters] higher than the present. According to the authors, "The most conservative estimates of palaeo-sea level during [the interglacial ~400,000 years ago] would require an ice mass loss equivalent to all of the modern Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets; the more extreme estimates would require additional ice mass loss from the East Antarctic ice sheet."

Thus, during prior interglacials, sea surface temperatures were up to 3 °C warmer, sea levels were up to 79 feet higher than the present, and up toall of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets melted away. All of this occurred naturally and at "safe" levels of CO2. Thus, there is no evidence that climate change within the present interglacial is any different, unprecedented, unnatural, unusual, or due to man-made CO2.

Top graph shows reconstructed sea surface temperatures over the past 425,000 years. Horizontal axis is thousands of years ago. Modern sea surface temperatures of ~17C are cooler than during the the early Holocene [past ~11,000 years] and during the past 3 interglacials, and were ~3C higher during the last interglacial ~125,000 years ago. Fig. 16.

Iberian margin palaeoclimate records from deep-sea cores of Martrat et al. (2007), showing benthic oxygen isotope record (bottom panel) and alkenone SST record (top panel). Bold numbers in lower plot are marine isotope stages (MIS). Shown for comparison are estimated times of arrival of Senegalese (warm water; pink shades) and Mediterranean (cool water; light blue shades) faunas to the Canary Islands during MIS 11 and MIS 5.5. (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

5 million year climate history reconstructed from marine sediment cores shows glacial-interglacial cycles have occurred every ~100,000 years over the past 1 million years. The 100,000 year cycle appears to be due to the 100,000 year solar geomagnetic cycle.

Highlights

The older high sea stand (if it is MIS 11) could have been +9 m to as high as +24 m.

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Both ages of deposits contain southern species of mollusks, indicating warmer waters.

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Both ages of deposits contain northern species of mollusks, indicating cooler waters.

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Thermally mixed faunas may be due to insolation-forced early warming, later cooling.

Abstract

We present the first U-series ages of corals from emergent marine deposits on the Canary Islands. Deposits at + 20 m are 481 ± 39 ka, possibly correlative to marine isotope stage (or MIS) 11, while those at + 12 and + 8 m are 120.5 ± 0.8 ka and 130.2 ± 0.8 ka, respectively, correlative to MIS 5.5. The age, elevations, and uplift rates derived from MIS 5.5 deposits on the Canary Islands allow calculations of hypothetical palaeo-sea levels during the MIS 11 high sea stand. Estimates indicate that the MIS 11 high sea stand likely was at least + 9 m (relative to present sea level) and could have been as high as + 24 m. The most conservative estimates of palaeo-sea level during MIS 11 would require an ice mass loss equivalent to all of the modern Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets; the more extreme estimates would require additional ice mass loss from the East Antarctic ice sheet. Extralimital southern species of mollusks, found in both MIS 11 and MIS 5.5 deposits on the Canary Islands, imply warmer-than-modern sea surface temperatures during at least a part of MIS 11 and much warmer sea surface temperatures during at least a part of MIS 5.5. Both MIS 11 and MIS 5.5 marine deposits on the Canary Islands contain extralimital northern species of mollusks as well, indicating cooler-than-present waters at times during these interglacial periods. We hypothesize that the co-occurrence of extralimital southern and northern species of marine invertebrates in the fossil record of the Canary Islands reflects its geographic location with respect to major synoptic-scale controls on climate and ocean currents. Previous interglacials may have been characterized by early, insolation-forced warming, along with northward migration of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ), accompanied by weakened trade winds and diminished upwelling. This allowed the arrival of extralimital southern taxa from the tropical Senegalese faunal province. During later parts of the MIS 11 and 5.5 interglacials, decreased insolation may have resulted in southward migration of the ITCZ, strengthened trade winds, and re-establishment of upwelling. Such conditions may have brought about not only local extinction of the Senegalese fauna, but allowed southward migration of the cooler-water Mediterranean fauna to the Canary Islands in the later parts of interglacials, a complex palaeoclimate record that is mirrored in the deep-sea core record.